~ what a lovely day

Throwing Biscuits

Today was hot. Really hot. After breakfast we went to central central park (see The Penniless Traveler Monday for more details!) We had to evacuate to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, just for the air conditioning.

On the way to the museum I asked my dad how close we were. “Within throwing distance,” he said. I nodded and turned to Natalie, “What did he say?” to which Natalie replies, in all honesty, and with great seriousness, “He said, throwing biscuits.” I’ll leave it at that. That’s my little sister for you.

Since we were at the museum, we figured we would look at some of the art. Here’s a little sampling.

We got lunch after the museum at a Greek restaurant. It was delicious, but the portions were crazy! We walked from The Met back to Times Square for a little bit of shopping and picture snapping. We visited the M&M store, sheet music store and FAO Shwartz. FAO Shwartz was a madhouse. Insanely crowded, you couldn’t move without bumping into children or a Peeta cardboard cut out. Luckily we did get to take a picture with our heroes. Iron Man and Captain America! So cool…

Back at the room we got ready for the show tonight, Evita! We got to the show and took our seats in the first row of the balcony, house right. Ricky Martin comes out, there are screams, I’m sure a few women have passed out. He’s great. But you know who’s even better? Elena Roger who plays Evita. I cried. I cried hard. Like a baby.

The show was incredible, music perfect and the lighting and set…holy canolli. They had fog on the stage that you could barely notice during the show, but it made all the scenes softer. The city streets descended back into the stage where you could see silhouettes of bodies moving back and forth. A really incredible show.

After the show we went to the stage door. Or maybe I should call it a circus? We stood behind the cones, as you are taught in Stage Door Etiquette 101. As we were all waiting, and when I say all, I mean people at the gate, people across the street, people standing on cars, on scaffolding, and people who went into the store next door to look out the windows… As we were waiting people would walk up to the restricted area and the security guard would repeatedly come down and kick them out telling them to move “back and over.”

One woman just moved over. Right in front of Natalie. Maybe she hadn’t taken Stage Door Etiquette 101. I told a few people off in my scary Boston accent at my intimidating height of 5′.5.

We got to meet some of the dancers and ensemble members and even Evita! And then, suddenly, the whole place erupted in screaming. People were on the ground, in the air, climbing over cars, jumping out windows (ok…maybe not that). We couldn’t see a dang thing and the gate got pulled closed so that people wouldn’t swarm. I don’t know what Ricky Martin was doing, and I guess I never will, but my best guess is that he stood on top of a taxi, took of his shirt, kissed some babies and danced down the street.

While this is all happening, one of Natalie and Dad’s favorite actors, who played Perun, is standing there being completely ignored. My mom grabbed our playbills and got autographs telling him that “my family loves you on Fringe!” “Where are they?” he asked. She pointed back at us as we all beamed and waved back, I’m sure we looked like we were hopped up on drugs.

After Ricky finished his shenanigans we got to take a picture with Michael. On our walk back to the hotel we saw the lead man from Porgy and Bess at his stage door, and Matthew Brodrick (doesn’t he look smiley?!) at his stage door.

What a wonderful day. That should be the end of our vacation. That would be the end of a normal vacation for people who are sane and reasonable. But we are neither of those things and tomorrow we board the Disney Cruise to Nova Scotia.